Kalost

Ammonia is added to drinking water and reacts with the chlorine to produce chlorimine whitch is a longer lasting disinfectant. Any residual chlorine detected in water will be the chlorimine. http://www.epcor.com/water/reports-edmonton/Pages/wq-daily.aspx?cid=1 is edmontons but im sure calgary is pretty close.

www.albertatrees.net/African-Cichlids.html

is there sufficient surface agitation for O2 levels? what is teh pH of the water? Edmonton water should be around 8-8.2 goldfish need 7.2-7.6. A goldfish in an alkaline tank will display some of the following symptoms. excess slime gasp at the surface death Maybe that water at home is lower pH. Do you have driftwood or anything in the tank at home? That lowers pH. But a constant pH is better than trying to buffer your pH. 0 nitrates means teh tank is not cycled. How long was the old filter media in teh 20 gal without a bio load? But im no expert. GL maybe someone else has ideas

got all my fish from him. Great fish.

Is this going to be strictly planted or are any fish going to be added. Very nice looking either way.

Or you can use pool filter sand. Looks great and is way cheaper than cichlid sand. Found at any pool store.

What plant are we talking about?

I use a fx5 and i have fry swimming around all the time. They are pretty smart they wont get sucked up imo.